Jan. 24, 2013

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Senate sets Monday vote on $50.5B Sandy aid

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Senate is set to vote Monday on a $50.5 billion emergency relief bill to help victims of Superstorm Sandy.

Northeast lawmakers from both parties hope to win Senate approval of the measure and send it to President Barack Obama, who has said he would sign it. The House passed it last week.

The lawmakers say the money is urgently needed to recover from one of the region’s worst storms, especially in the hardest hit states of New York, New Jersey and Connecticut.

Fiscal conservatives say the bill would add to the nation’s debt unless offsetting spending cuts are made elsewhere to pay for the Sandy aid.

Sandy pounded the East Coast and has been blamed for 140 deaths and billions of dollars in residential and business property damage.

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Speaker after speaker before the state commission investigating the response to Superstorm Sandy and other recent storms said Thursday that utility companies’ communication with customers and local officials was lacking and power restoration took too long.

It was the sixth public hearing held by the Moreland Commission on Utility Storm Preparation and Response. Gov. Andrew Cuomo created the commission to evaluate utility companies’ performance after Sandy on Oct. 29, tropical storms Irene and Lee in August and September 2011, and an ice storm in December 2008.

Clarkstown Supervisor Alexander Gromack said Orange & Rockland Utilities Inc. did not provide reliable information to customers about when their power would be back on and provided a daily update to public officials that was “virtually useless.” The town’s Highway Department crews cleared more than 400 roads after Sandy, but 60 roads were blocked for many more days, he said.

“There should have been multiple O&R crews around the clock, 24/7 teaming up with our highway crews, starting immediately after the storm, working together to clear lines, so we could clear roads,” he said.

Nancy Petty of the Cedar Knolls Colony in Yonkers said Consolidated Edison gave members of the community “false hope” that their power would be back soon after Sandy. It took 12 days, she said.

“My husband is handicapped and as a result after a week we had to move out. The house was colder in than out. And at great expense, we had to move to New York, along with just about everybody else on our road. He has a stairlift and it was inoperable because we had no power,” she said.

The six utilities operating in New York, and the Long Island Power Authority, are monopolies and have no risk of losing parts of their territory if they perform poorly, said state Department of Financial Services Commissioner Benjamin Lawsky, commission co-chairman.

The Moreland Commission’s Jan. 7 interim report states that the state Public Service Commission has been a “toothless tiger” for too long and recommends strengthening its oversight of utilities, such as through larger fines. Under current law, it can levy penalties of up to $100,000 a day after a court proceeding. The report recommends, and the governor’s budget proposes, changing that to 0.02 percent of utility revenues. That would be about $2 million a day for Con Edison. The report also recommends privatizing the Long Island Power Authority.

Spokesmen for Con Edison and O&R said they have been cooperating with the Moreland Commission.

“We no more wanted customers to be out than they wanted to be out, but the restorations had to be done safely,” Con Edison spokesman Chris Olert said.

O&R has been working with local officials and the communities it serves to learn how it can improve its disaster response plan, spokesman Michael Donovan said.